See it, believe it; ideally, both

1 Corinthians 13:12 "Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror, then we shall see face to face."

I see things much easier and understand them much deeper when I have a picture right in front of me. People always tell the single person that "there are plenty of fish in the sea." The phrase becomes downright annoying and trite. However, when that single person gets out into the world and actually sees all the people around, it rings true and the cliche aspect falls away.

For me, it is rather hard for me to know that I'm surrounded by Christians when Seattle doesn't exactly encourage following the mainstream religious beliefs. Great for people who don't want to be locked into "a certain way" of worshiping, but rather poopy for someone who just wants to talk about God with someone. My delight was rather high up on the scale when I sat in a school auditorium on Easter Sunday, realizing that I was in a room full of people who shared the beliefs that I did, and most of them were around my age. Quite encouraging.

My Mom has no interest in watching Saving Pvt. Ryan or The Passion of the Christ. She can imagine the horrors and details well enough in her brain without exposing herself to that level of gore or pain. Myself, I don't think I need to see every heinous crime re-enacted for me on screen to know that the world is in trouble. However, I would offer that the visual now and then can come in handy. I own Passion and have seen it three times since it was released in theaters. That's just about right for me. I can get an idea of the kind of suffering that Christ suffered and appreciate the fact that it clearly wasn't easy for him. He didn't want to go through that sort of pain. Hits it home a bit better for me.

One of my favorite persons in the world isn't really looking for a church. She is considering the idea of going to a Quaker meeting, but she and her fiancee are rather content to see God in nature. To take examples from what is all around them and apply it to their lives. I can relate.

After a reasonable sermon at church, I trotted off to my quasi-regular jogging location, and started circling around. As I passed a rather large grass patch, I noticed that some folks had taken quite the span of time to erect thousands and thousands of plastic white crosses. After my run I went up to their little tent and found out that it was the Northwest Memorial to the Iraq War. They were quite nice people. They weren't saying war is good or bad. Their group is made up of all kinds of folks. They just wanted to remind people that war costs lives. That people from all over the world, (Australia, Germany, Iraq, Africans) were dying. They wanted people to process the million+ people who had died in a war. By the crowds they had and the attitude I saw of people walking though, looking at all the names, I'd say it worked.

No, don't visualize everything. There isn't time and I am pretty sure it would start to lose its effectiveness. You think you are over-inundated now... oy. Still, visuals help. I think that's why Jesus was such a fan of the parable. You can hear something and think about it in church, but seeing it in front of you can make all the difference.